04 Aug 2021

 The magistrate court here on Tuesday sentenced Gakebalemoge Kekerwane of Rapeitane to 10 years in jail for rape.

In passing the sentence, Jwaneng senior magistrate, Ms Caroline Kataba said rape remained a rampant and vexing crime. 

Ms Kataba said Batswana were up in arms against the law and the courts as they believed the system was too soft on rapists, which gave them the boldness to commit the offence. 

There was need therefore to take stern action against perpetrators to send a warning to would-be offenders. She indicated that in as much as Kekerwane had pleaded not guilty, the onus was on the prosecution to prove his guilt, which it did to the satisfaction of the court. 

Ms Kataba said for the accused to be found guilty, the prosecution had to prove three key elements; that the accused person had been rightly identified, that he had sex with the accused person and that sexual act was non-consensual. 

She said the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty as it produced five witnesses to that effect. 

She said one of those key witnesses included the victim herself, who indicated that the accused was her ex-boyfriend and therefore knew him well, which ruled out any chance of mistaken identity. 

She said the fact that the accused admitted to having had sex with his victim, although claiming it was consensual, also satisfied the element that the sexual act happened. 

Ms Kataba said that one of the witnesses, a medical doctor who examined the victim, indicated that there were physical injuries to the victim, which showed that there was some violence. 

“The fact that there was violence points to the issue of lack of consent. If there was consent there would never have been any violence, which satisfies the third element of non-consent,” she said. 

Ms Kataba also said that another key witness that the prosecution brought, a forensic scientist indicated the presence of the accused’s DNA on the victim and her clothing items, showing close contact. 

The accused had argued that as far as he knew the act was consensual as the victim submitted to it, but the magistrate indicated that the victim said she submitted to the accused because she was being threatened with a wire. 

In mitigation, he pleaded with the court to be lenient with him as his wife had just had a baby and there was nobody to take care of her. 

He also presented himself as the sole caretaker of his father’s livestock. Kekerwane was ultimately given a 10-year sentence,that would run consecutively with any existing or future terms. The sentence will run from the time he was taken into custody. 

It was the state’s case that Kekerwane had unlawful canal knowledge of his victim without her consent on September 9, 2017, after he reportedly forced her to his house, where he forced her to undress, threatening to beat her with a wire should she refuse. 

He went on to rape her and without using a condom. ENDS